Victims of Uprising
by SunshineOwl
Summary: Something's arising in Central that's got the military on their toes. How is it that Korra, an automail mechanic, and the two brothers become roped into a seemingly political rebellion? Take much caution, make few friends, trust no motives. The uprising has begun.
1. Girl with The Wrench, Boy with no Hands

Sunsets were good. Light reflected on the pale blankets of snow and left the memories of stars glittering behind it. The young girl with the brown skin and browner hair deftly smoothed the rag over her wrench as if she'd been doing it for hundreds of lifetimes. When the sun was secured behind the banks of snow, she went inside and closed the door behind her. She meant to move soundlessly, but only two things kept Korra quiet: sunsets and automail. Then sun had set and the automail shop was closed, so the door slammed behind her.

"Korra, don't shut the door so loudly," called a voice from the next room.

"Sorry Gran Gran," came her mumbled apology.

She slurped stew for dinner and loudly took the stairs to her room where she slammed the door once again. After crawling into bed, a small white dog with an automail leg found her way into the young girl's lap. As she fiddled with the leg, unnecessary tears began to pool in Korra's eyes.

"I don't mean to be so loud," she said miserably, her throat dry and scratchy. "I wish I had a friend." She smiled sadly at the dog in her lap. "You and Gran Gran. That's all I've got, Naga."

The girl became disgusted by her tears and wiped them away roughly. She wrapped herself in blankets so when the next day came, she could do the same thing over again.

Sometimes it was a miserable life. Each day was filled with the same fate. All she could do was wait. Wait for the sunsets, wait for the automail orders, wait for something to come around that probably was never going to. But then she'd go to her workbench and remember all she had to learn, and that there were customers, actual people in the world, relying on her. Korra pulled on her overalls and began work on an order while the sun rose and peaked and began to dip back down. When the snow reflected that familiar orange glow, she set her tools down and stood outside for the millionth time.

But tonight, she couldn't watch the sun set. She didn't get to see the sparkles of star dust cover the pearly hills because two figures were visible on the path that lead to her house and automail shop.

"Gran Gran, I think we've got customers," Korra called into the house, none too quietly.

"At this hour?" The wrinkled woman emerged from the doorway and threw an oily towel over her hunched shoulder. They waited at the threshold while the figures came closer into view. Within a few moments, it was clear that the silhouettes belonged to two children. One was in a wheelchair, the other had something wrong. He seemed out of proportion, as though his arms were too short for his body.

The boys approached Korra and her grandmother. The wheelchair boy asked,

"Is this is automail shop?"

"Aye," was Gran Gran's gruff reply. "But I'm afraid we close at sundown. You'll have to come back in the morning."

But neither of the four moved. Korra surveyed their visitors, who appeared about her age. Wheelchair boy had green eyes and brown hair while the other's was more blackish with golden eyes. She couldn't hold in a gasp as she saw that the boy in the wheelchair had no feet, and the boy next to him had no hands. Only stumps wrapped in bandages.

"Please let us stay here," said the boy with no hands in a steady voice. "We've traveled a long way and we're tired. We have no money."

Gran Gran narrowed an eye at the pair and raised her voice with careful ferocity. "You come here at sunset, two boys, traveling with no money and in obvious need of automail. You ask to sleep here. How do we know you're not thieves? How do we know you don't have gunmen hiding beyond the banks?" The old woman threw a bony, pointed finger toward the stacked snow yards away.

The boy with no hands assumed a stony expression when he said evenly, almost fiercely, "I guess you'll just have to trust us."


	2. Chink in the Armor

Sunsets were good. They were not as good alone as they were with friends.

It was three years ago. It seemed like yesterday she was outfitting the boy with no hands and the boy with no feet into automail. But, no, it had been three years. Three years ago, Korra found the two boys at her automail shop on a snowy sunset. It was a sunset like that one that she watched now, waiting for the brothers' return. They really weren't to be due back until tomorrow, but she found herself sitting in the slush on the grass, one eye on the retreating sun, one eye on the road. Alas, they did not return a day early, for the sun settled under the hills and their forms were not visible from the bumpy horizon.

When Korra woke the next morning, the bittersweet taste of a pleasant dream stuck to the roof of her mouth. She'd dreamed that the brothers really were home a day early, but then she reminded herself not to get her hopes up, that they'd be home tonight, and until then, she had orders to fill. She descended the stairs to find two heads of brown and black hair at the kitchen table.

"_You're home!_" She tackled the pair and snaked an arm around each neck.

"Yeah, we got here late last night," Bolin said happily as cereal and milk dribbled onto his lip.

"How was Central? Is Colonel Mustang alright? Did you pass your annual assessments?"

"Calm down," Mako said, mouth full of cereal. "Sit down and we'll tell you everything." His face assumed a serious expression as Korra pulled out a chair. Mako put his hands in his lap. "Something's wrong in Central. Some type of uprising or something. They don't usually call State Philosophers to Central for annual assessments, but Colonel Flame Head told me they couldn't afford to have personnel deployed. Apparently, they need all hands on deck and they don't want this getting out."

"Spirits. Did the Colonel tell you anything else?"

"He didn't say much, but from what I gathered, something's got the military on their toes."

"Can we do something to help?"

"We asked the same thing," Bolin supplied. "We … we don't have all the answers, Korra, but ..."

She stuck her lower lip out. "But what?"

"The Colonel told us automail mechanics have something to do with it."

"_What_? Automail mechanics? What do you mean? What's going on?"

Bolin raised his hands in surrender. "I don't know, I don't know. But, Korra … be careful. You don't need to be dragged into this."

She pulled her wrench from her pocket and swung it around in her hand. "The hell I don't! Just watch them try and pull something on me! I'll knock some heads, they won't know what hit 'em!" She thrust the wrench in the air. Bolin laughed while Mako's stony features did not falter.

"This is no time to be messing around. The Colonel said this is serious."

"I'm _being_ serious," she protested, twirling the wrench on her index finger. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got some orders to fill." Her blue overalls and brown hair disappeared as she strolled to her workbench in the neighboring room. "And, boneheads?" she called over, "I'm glad you're home."

"What are we going to do with her?" Mako said gravely, planting his head into his automail hand.

"Relax, Brother. Korra will be the last person anything happens to. She's as strong as we are. There'll be no problem."

"For her sake, I hope you're right."

If he had real palms, they'd be sweating. But just that was the problem: his palms. He tried to hide them at breakfast, but the automail was nicked and scarred. It was nothing compared to when he'd come back from a fight, but he could imagine Korra's reaction when -

"Is someone there?"

He started slightly at her voice and peeked around the door frame to find the girl at her workbench, eyes trained upon whatever she was working on this time.

"Uh, yeah. Hey Korra."

She looked up to see the fire bender in the doorway. This was not a friendly meeting; his face gave it away. "You _didn't_."

"It's not that bad, I swear! Just scratches is all!"

She rose from the bench and stuck her fists on her hips. "If it's only scratches, you wouldn't be coming here like this. Let me see them," she ordered, holding her hand open to him, fingers beckoning.

Shamefully, he flipped over his hands and held them out to her.

"Just _scratches_?" she fumed, fingering a hole in the automail that left wires exposed.

"Y-yes. That particular bit got scratched … off."

"How in the _world_ did this happen? You just went for your assessment! Surely you didn't-"

Mako smoothed a broken hand over his face. "Could you please stop yelling at me and fix my automail?"

Once his hands were carefully removed, Korra got to work while Mako sat behind here. Their backs faced each other's.

"So … how _did_ you break your automail?" she asked more quietly this time. "You weren't in a fight, were you?" Now her voice was not of anger, but of concern.

"W-well." He squeezed his eyes shut. "We … we can't really tell you."

Korra spun around to face the back of his head. "_What_? You mean you're working with the military? Why're they hushing you up?"

"We're already working with the military, remember? He looped his stump over the silver pocket watch and pulled it out for her to see. "But … the Colonel asked us not to say anything. I'm sorry."

She turned back around and continued her work. "Okay. Just be careful."

When the repairs were complete and Mako's hands were secured to his stumps, Korra fiddled with her rag as she watched him leave, and she lingered long after he'd left the room.

What were they getting in to?


	3. Young Brothers of Saw

**A/N: Sorry for the delayed update, I've had some issues working through the plot. Fair warning, this is a bit gruesome. **

**Can you guess what Mako and Bolin did to lose their hands/feet? You're about to find out!**

**And, hm... I wonder what the Other Thing is... **

The blanket of night was restless. The nightmares were unmasked, the children weren't even granted the innocence and false security of a good dream then bad, but plunged into sour memories and gruesome recurrences.

_"Mako, I'm cold."_

_ "I know."_

_ "Mako, I'm hungry."_

_ "I know."_

_ "When will Mommy and Daddy come back?"_

_ The older boy turned from the chalk on the ground to his little brother. They were both too young for this. Too young to be street rats. Too young to be orphans. Too young to be studying human transmutation._

_ "Soon. I'm working on it."_

_ The little green eyed boy's legs fell underneath him as he plopped onto the asphalt. One hand rubbed his nose and the other held his empty tummy. "How will they come back?"_

_ "With alchemy," Mako said, feigning expertise. "We'll learn it, you and I. We'll learn it and transmute them back to life."_

_ "But, I thought was book said that was bad," Bo pointed out._

_ The firebender shrugged. "Books lie." Even then, he had the smallest shard of doubt in his tattered heart. Human transmutation _was _a taboo, but what else was he supposed to do? Where was he supposed to go? He, a nine year old boy, and his brother just teetering over seven, on the streets. Where could they turn to? This time, there was no back alley, no alternate dumpster, no trick or grin that would get them what they wanted. It was all he could do to try._

_ Still, despite his ambition, he was not an alchemist. He had trouble grasping even the simplest techniques and theories, and even then, performing the movements was another story entirely. But his brother watched from the sidelines as the elder boy scraped his hands with concrete and broken chalk, and Mako knew there wasn't much time before they'd starve, or be put in a home. The sun rose and dipped and Mako's hands bore the scars of practice and limited progress._

She did not remember her parents. She hardly remembered her own childhood. Sometimes, in day dreams or nightmares, old memories were unearthed, dusty and clouded, from the back of her head. Terrible images like from a horrible picture book. She'd run to Gran Gran and ask timidly, hands wringing behind her child's back with anxiety, and horror. The old woman's expression did not falter. "Yours is a long story. Maybe some other time." She'd wave her hand dismissively, closing the conversation.

Most nights, under the freckled stars, this was the extent of her frights. But of course, because the brothers were home, the terror would not stop there. Tonight she'd wrestle and squirm to relive a horrific tale that was not even her own.

_ "Who are you?" she blinked._

_ "We already said. I'm Mako; this is my little brother Bolin." He gestured a stump to the boy beside him who was shoveling spoonfuls of stew into his mouth as the stubs of his legs dangled over the edge of his chair._

_ "I mean ... where're you from? What are you doing here? Where are your hands and his feet?"_

_ The one called Mako swallowed. "Do you have a bathroom?"_

_ "Behind the stairs."_

_ Later, as Korra climbed into bed, Gran Gran folded the covers back, a gesture that seemed natural to anyone, but was really a sign of affection, because who else was going to send you off to a land of monsters and darkness? _

_ "Don't ask too many questions to those two, not yet. Right now, it's important that we get them into some quality automail. Just let them be. Boys don't show up anywhere with no hands or feet without a painful story on their backs."_

_ Young Korra nodded. She had no idea._

_ As quickly as the days come, the next two years passed under her eyelids, a scrapbook with missing pages and sour mementos._

_ "Hold still, I can't measure your feet with you squirming around!"_

_ At the click of boots, the brothers left and returned with watches and titles._

_ Automail. Fourteen months of recovery._

_ "Leave me alone, I'm reading!"_

_ "Leave me alone, I'm practicing."_

_ "You broke your automail _again_?"_

_ "We are _not_ going to Rush Valley!"_

_ "Korra, stop being so loud!"_

_ And ... there was that other thing ... But no, she didn't even want to think about that. _

_ But trapped amongst these memories was that one memory. It wasn't automail. It wasn't reading, practicing, or even the Other Thing. It was truly a horror, truly something from a nightmare. But it was worse than a nightmare, because it was one hundred percent real._

_ The tension at the table was thick in the air._

_ "We've outfitted you with top-notch automail. We've allowed you to stay here, in our care, in our home. We've not asked you any questions, made no assumptions or judgments. But now, we need answers." Gran Gran sat back in her chair, hands resting on the table. "Tell us everything."_

_ "When I was nine and Bo was seven, our parents were killed. We didn't have any other family members that we could go with, so we lived on the streets."_

_ From the rehearsed tone of his voice, Korra wondered how many times Mako had to tell this terrible story._

_ "We – we didn't know what to do, we were young, and-"_

_ "Don't make excuses for yourself," Gran Gran said strongly. "Just stick to what happened."_

_ Mako nodded thickly while Bolin stared down at his lap. Were his eyes guilty? "So," Mako continued, "I thought we could use alchemy to return our parents to us."_

_ Korra's mouth made a small oval in shock, but Gran Gran was unflappable as always._

_ "I tried to study alchemy, but I just didn't get it. I was young-" he caught himself. "I eventually understood the basic movement of transmutation and I was able to replicate a human transmutation array. Bolin and I gathered the necessary elements to account for two adult bodies. But then ... that night I had a dream. There was a higher force that told me: 'Equal exchange: a hand for a hand, a foot for a foot.' I thought of it as an omen, or the word of a god. So, thinking that was all we had left to do, we..." He swallowed and stared dead into Gran Gran's eyes. There was hardly any room for shame in his even voice, no space for pity in his hard eyes. "I sawed off Bolin's feet and he my hands. We had the transmutation circle and the elements already set up and all, so we added the hands and feet to the array and performed the clapping movement. I don't know what I, we, expected, but ... nothing happened."_

_ Korra gasped and her mind went white. Bolin's eyes didn't leave his lap, but Gran Gran nodded as if she'd already heard this tale. Like she expected it._

_ Mako swallowed again. "And ... we worked to improve our bending to stay on the streets, since we'd given up on alchemy and bending was all we had. Then we heard of you, the esteemed automail mechanics in Resembool. We traveled, and now ..." He put his automail palms on the table, as though folding closed a story book. _A horrible story book,_ Korra thought._

_ The old woman nodded again. The story was not complete. There were still gaps and holes and tears in the binding, but she nodded nonetheless. "Okay. Go to bed." Her tone was not accepting, not even kind, but it was neutral, almost indifferent. _

_ Mako stood and left the room, Bolin the ruffled duckling following closely. Korra sat in shock, jaw slack. They ... they sawed off ..._

_ "What are you still doing there?" Gran Gran called from the doorway. "Go to bed."_

Her eyes eased open. She'd dreamt this so many times, it was hardly a shock to her now. The dream itself was not a surprise, but what did send shivers down her spine was simply the thought of those brothers putting a saw to their wrists or ankles.

She could not do much for them, sitting at her workbench. She could repair their automail, wash blood from their shirts and pick potatoes from the garden any day. What really mattered, though, was not her wrench, her workbench, or her blueprints. It was not her washboard or her apron. What mattered was that she could stay in the creaky Resembool house and give the young brothers of saw a place to go home to.


End file.
